When and how to change exercises to reduce the risk of overuse injuries

- Tweet0
- 0
- Pin It 0
- 0
- Subscribe to RSS
Subscribe

Subject: When and how to change exercises to reduce the risk of overuse injuries

Today Pavel expands on another topic from the Huberman Lab podcast.

“When and how to change exercises to reduce the risk of overuse injuries for a midlife trainee with some wear and tear?”

Start with the obvious: get a medical clearance, address asymmetries and imbalances.

Then pick exercises that:

Engage a lot of muscle mass and cover many bases;
Have a great carryover to other activities;
Are easy to learn;
Have a good safety track record for trainees with mileage;
Do not hurt you.

Some of our favorites for hard people with high mileage:

Kettlebell swing
Kettlebell goblet squat
Kettlebell get-up
Kettlebell clean-and-jerk (single arm)
Kettlebell military press (single arm)
Barbell Zercher squat
Barbell narrow sumo deadlift
Pullup (on parallel bars or rings)

The next step is to learn the skills. Your options:

You cannot go wrong with the Kettlebells StrongFirst online course
designed for athletes with high mileage.

Start training and be in no hurry to up your numbers. Soviets refused to force strength and muscle mass development in their athletes because tendons and ligaments have poor blood supply, grow slowly, and cannot keep up with muscular and nervous system adaptations.

A great programming tool for minimizing the risk of injury while delivering steady gains is “step loading.” We use it in many of our programs, including the above Kettlebells StrongFirst online course.

Moving on to the question of change.

Once you have found “your” exercises, stick with them for years if not decades. Feel free to “play jazz” with their variations, as Prof. Stuart McGill put it. E.g., two-arm swings, one-arm swings, hand-to-hand swings...

These specialized variety exercises have multiple benefits:

Reduce the risk of overuse injury
Recruit muscles and motor units previously unused in the main lift, strengthen them, and integrate them into it
Strengthen weak links
Improve technique
Prevent habituation
Stimulate neuroplasticity
Reduce fatigue
Give higher returns from a given training volume

StrongFirst Certified Master Instructor Fabio Zonin and I

will take a deep dive into specialized variety at the Programming Demystified

seminar that you can take in person in Vicenza, Italy or online on June 28-29.

The number of exercise variations can range from zero (exhibit A: the Bulgarian national weightlifting team) to a hundred (exhibit B: the Soviet national weightlifting team).

According to Mark Reifkind, StrongFirst Certified Master Instructor Emeritus, five or fewer variations per lift hit the spot for most trainees, including serious lifters. This is the StrongFirst standard.

There are many ways to program these “same but different” exercises. Change them:

From set to set
After several sets
From day to day
Every 6 weeks

Prioritize variations that address your weaknesses and/or improve your technique.

E.g., you are lacking tightness in your weighted pullups. Instead of attaching weight to a belt, hang a kettlebell on one foot and cross your ankles. Your abs will contract whether they like it or not.

Medical professionals who work with lifters often use specialized variety to treat minor injuries. They choose exercise versions that do not hurt and allow the greatest safe range of motion. As Eastern European strength athletes say, “pump through an injury.”

Some years down the road circumstances may force you to replace some exercises, temporarily or permanently. Until then, carry on.

Just Added

SFL Certification: Athens, Greece—November 28-30, 2025

JOIN THE STRONGFIRST FORUM

Subscribe

Subject: When and how to change exercises to reduce the risk of overuse injuries